News & Advice

Grease, grime and dirt love to build up on extractor hoods. It’s one of nature’s laws. Because your cooking hood lives right above your hob and its primary purpose is to draw up the smoke or steam that your cooking food gives off, there’s no avoiding it getting slightly greasy over time. What can be avoided, though, is a thick layer of grease building up and making it both dirty and less effective. The longer you put off cleaning your extractor hood and filter, the less effective it will be and the harder you’ll have to work to get it clean. Be proactive and get your extractor hood back to full working order by following our guide to cleaning both the hood itself and the…

A fridge not cooling is one of the most frustrating household problems because it can make all of the food you currently have go off and leave you without a way to store any more. Your refrigerator isn’t necessarily a write-off if it has an issue with cooling, however. It might look as though it’s working fine – the light comes on, it’s still making that familiar soft humming noise – but there are a number of internal problems that could have led to the cooling mechanism failing. Here are a few of the most common refrigerator faults so if your fridge isn’t cooling you can figure out if you need a fridge repair service or not. Make sure that you turn off your appliance…

There are a huge range of choices to make when it comes to fitting out your kitchen, from the colour of the walls to the storage solutions, the % split between fridge and freezer to the trade-off between worktop space and cooking equipment. One of the most important decisions you’ll make in terms of cooking appliances, however, is choosing between a gas or electric oven. This choice is normally driven by the flat or house you’re furnishing – if there’s no gas then your decision is made for you. If you do have the choice between these two different oven types, though, this article is for you. There are several factors you need to consider when you’re choosing an oven, here are what we consider…

Like all household appliances – there are a range of things that can go wrong with your washing machine, leaving you without a way of cleaning your clothes. From water leaking onto your floor to holes mysteriously appearing in your favourite clothes, washing machine problems can be some of the most frustrating. Often, these issues will only get worse if they’re not repaired straight away, so make sure to diagnose and troubleshoot any washing machine issues immediately using our guide to common washing machine problems and effective solutions. What’s the problem if my washing machine won’t spin? If your washing machine isn’t spinning, the first thing you should check is that the switch on the door or lid is not broken. This switch controls the…

Click the map to view full size image It’s no secret that the UK is a huge importer of food and drink, it’s not like we can grow exotic fruit in our allotments and we’re not exactly known for our vineyards! Just how large scale our import demand is might still come as a surprise to you though, as it did to us when we carried out research on the top food and drink imports to the UK from 191 countries. The import data for the first 6 months of 2018 was collected from HM Revenue & Customs and broken down into countries and categories. What it revealed was that we import a huge amount of food and drink from pretty much every country in…

The last thing you want when you’ve got guests over for dinner is smoke coming out of your oven. Aside from the embarrassment it can cause, smoke isn’t exactly a flavour you want accompanying every meal you serve. There are a number of reasons why you might have smoke coming out of your oven, so if your gas or electric oven is smoking right now and you’re trying to figure out what’s going on, read on to find out what it could be. Causes of Smoking Ovens Factory coatings or chemicals burning If your oven is new, this is the most likely reason that it’s smoking. When being manufactured, it’s common practice for ovens to have an oil based coating that can cause smoke as…

Everybody has domestic appliances in their home, from ovens to washing machines and everything in between, so we all know that they can break down at the least convenient times. Sometimes the appliance breakdown itself isn’t even the worst of it – being hit with a large but unavoidable repair bill in a tough month can be expensive. Instead of waiting until your appliance breaks down to think about how you’d deal with doing without or having to pay for a repair, making use of an appliance service plan can give you peace of mind and save you time and money. Benefits of an Appliance Service Plan Cheap – From as little as £2.60 a month, you can have the guarantee that any time your…